Run: 2026-02-19-01KHTYJRERR53CCZTX1TB06MPR

The Raven's Nest hummed with its usual evening crowd, smoke and conversation threading through amber light. Aurora wiped down the mahogany bar top, her movements automatic after three months of shifts. The green neon from outside painted strange shadows across the bottles behind her. "Another pint of the bitter, love." A patron slid his empty glass across. She pulled the tap, watching foam crest over dark beer. The door chimed. Cold October air swept in, carrying the smell of rain and exhaust fumes. Aurora glanced up, then froze. The woman in the doorway wore a charcoal suit that cost more than Aurora made in two months. Designer heels clicked against worn floorboards. But beneath the corporate armor, beneath the sharp bob of honey-blonde hair, those green eyes remained unchanged. "Eva." The name escaped before Aurora could stop it. Three years dissolved like sugar in hot water. Eva's perfect composure cracked. "Rory? Christ, is that really you?" They stared across the bar's smoky expanse. Aurora became acutely aware of her faded jeans, the delivery company logo on her polo shirt, the beer foam on her hands. "Working here now?" Eva's voice carried forced brightness. "Something like that." Aurora finished pouring the bitter, slid it to the waiting patron. Her hands stayed steady. Small mercies. Eva approached the bar, each step measured. Up close, Aurora catalogued the changes. Fine lines around Eva's mouth. A hardness in her jaw that hadn't existed during their Cardiff days. The friendship bracelet they'd made at fifteen—gone. "I didn't know you'd moved to London." Eva perched on a barstool, handbag placed precisely on the bar. "About three months ago." Aurora grabbed a cloth, wiped down already-clean taps. Anything to keep her hands busy. "Three months." Eva's laugh held edges. "I work just round the corner. Mergers and acquisitions at Thornfield & Associates." Of course she did. Aurora remembered Eva at nineteen, passionate about environmental law, swearing she'd never sell out to corporate interests. Time made liars of everyone. "Congratulations." The word tasted like ash. "Thanks. And you're... tending bar?" "Among other things." Silas emerged from the back room, silver signet ring catching the light. He took in the scene with practiced ease—Aurora's rigid posture, Eva's designer everything, the crackling tension between them. "I'll handle things here," he said quietly. "Take your break." Aurora wanted to refuse, wanted the bar as a barrier between them. But Silas's expression brooked no argument. "Come on." She untied her apron. "We can talk in the back booth." They settled into cracked leather seats beneath a faded map of Prague. Eva's perfume—something expensive and unfamiliar—competed with decades of cigarette smoke embedded in the walls. "So." Eva traced patterns on the scarred table. "Last I heard, you were finishing your law degree." "Things change." "Your parents must be—" "Disappointed? Furious? Pick your adjective." Aurora signaled Silas for two whiskies. Dutch courage felt necessary. Eva's manicured nails drummed against wood. "You just vanished, Rory. One day you were there, the next—nothing. No forwarding address, no explanation." The whiskies arrived. Aurora took a burning sip before answering. "I needed to leave Cardiff." "Because of Evan?" The name hit like a slap. Aurora's hand moved unconsciously to her left wrist, thumb finding the crescent scar hidden beneath her watchband. "How did you—" "I ran into him last month. At a Law Society dinner." Eva's voice dropped. "He mentioned you'd had a 'disagreement.'" "That's one word for it." "Rory, what happened? We used to tell each other everything." Used to. Past tense carried its own violence. "You were in New York." Aurora kept her voice level. "That internship at the UN. Living your dream." "You could have called. Emailed. Something." "And said what? That I'd thrown away everything we'd planned because I was too stupid to see what Evan really was? That I was sleeping on park benches because I couldn't go home?" Eva's foundation couldn't hide the color draining from her face. "Park benches? Jesus, Rory." "Only for a week. Until I scraped together bus fare to London." "I would have helped. You know I would have." "Do I?" The whisky made Aurora reckless. "You were posting Instagram stories from Manhattan rooftops. Hashtag living my best life. What was I supposed to say? Help, I'm drowning while you're conquering the world?" "That's not fair." "Isn't it?" Aurora gestured at Eva's suit, her bag, the gold watch glinting on her wrist. "Look at you. Everything we said we'd be. And look at me." "You're alive." Eva's voice cracked. "That's all that matters." "Don't patronize me." "I'm not—" Eva stopped, composed herself. "I looked for you. After Evan told me you'd left. I called your parents." "I'm sure that went well." "Your father threatened to have me arrested for harassment." Despite everything, Aurora almost smiled. "Sounds like Dad." "He said you'd made your choices. That if you wanted to throw your life away, that was your business." "Also sounds like Dad." They sat in silence. The bar's noise washed over them—laughter, arguments, the clink of glass on glass. Life continuing its messy orbit while they sat frozen in their booth. "I kept thinking you'd reach out." Eva stared into her whisky. "Every birthday, every Christmas. I'd check my phone, thinking this time..." "Eva—" "No, let me finish." Tears threatened Eva's careful makeup. "I knew something was wrong. The way you'd gone quiet those last few months. The excuses about bruises. I knew, and I still left for New York." "I told you to go." "Since when do I listen to you?" The ghost of their old dynamic flickered between them. Aurora remembered seventeen, Eva talking her into sneaking out for underground poetry readings. Twenty-one, Eva defending Aurora's choice to study law even as her heart wasn't in it. Twenty-three, Eva bouncing with excitement about the internship while Aurora smiled and bled internally from wounds she couldn't name. "I'm glad you went." Aurora meant it. "One of us needed to make it out intact." "Did we? Make it out?" Eva gestured at herself. "Sixty-hour weeks. A Kensington flat I never see. My therapist says I'm married to my work because it can't leave me." "Eva—" "I've been in London two years. Two years, Rory. And this is where you've been? Ten minutes from my office?" "I didn't know you were here." "Would it have mattered?" Aurora couldn't answer that. Wouldn't. Eva pulled out her phone. "I'm programming my number. Use it or don't, but it's there." "I don't have a phone anymore." Eva's fingers stilled. "What?" "Evan liked to check it. Easier to just not have one." "Rory..." "Don't." Aurora drained her whisky. "I'm not that person anymore." "No." Eva studied her, those green eyes seeing too much. "You're not. Neither am I."